| This book, subtitled Fawn M. Brodie and Joseph Smith in Retrospect, edited by Newell G. Bringhurst and published by the Utah State University Press, is supposedly intended to correct the errors made 50 years ago by author Brodie. However, we found it most revealing. I was especially interested in Todd Compton's chapter 6 beginning on page 154. Compton is a Mormon! He begins by saying that anyone who would seriously study Joseph Smith's polygamous marriages should begin with Brodie's No Man Knows My History. Compton admits that before Brodie, few had seriously studied Smith's polygamy on a scholarly level. He seems, in his first paragraph to sympathize with the mistakes she may have made. He makes the following positive statements about her contribution to the study: She is the only scholar to publish a footnoted list of Smith's wives with small biographies of each. Others have profited by her research, especially Donna Hill and Daniel Bachman. Furthermore, Compton calls Brodie a psychohistorian, especially interested in documenting and "evaluating Joseph Smith's sexuality." Though he says Brodie credits Smith with too many wives; she documents 49, he only found 33, but he makes quite a point that 11 of these were polyandrous and several (11) were between 14 and 20 when he married them! He is critical of Brodie for dwelling on Joseph's polygamy-her book contains only 500 pages and his almost 800-and I believe his has far more words per page! Compton says there have been several biographies of Brigham Young that "do not find it necessary to mention that he was a polygamist." Evidently he hasn't read too much of Brigham Young? Remember, too, that Smith was killed at 39 while Young lived to be 77. He had time to take more wives! Compton quotes another critic of Brodie's who mentions her use of printed anti-Mormon sources. What was she to do? The officials in Salt Lake City made it embarrassing for her to use the Church library. However, the RLDS were cordial and give her every assistance, but her own family all but disowned her! One would have thought that the RLDS would have been the more distant since their position is that Joseph was not a polygamist. He says Brodie used printed materials rather than diaries or autobiographies. He compares Brodie with Juanita Brooks. He admits that Brodie left Salt lake early in her career and had little opportunity to research Utah libraries where most of the Mormon diaries were to be found. Compton calls it ironic that the church's policy of limiting access to key historical documents probably influenced her to use antagonistic sources. He criticizes Brodie but admits Zina Huntington Jacobs did marry Joseph Smith polyandrously. Evidently she did quote from a later, unsympathetic source. If the Church leaders in Salt Lake City had cooperated with her, she might not have had to quote from a source that was unsympathetic. Compton mentions an instance where Donna Hill, a sympathetic Mormon author, quoted Brodie which shows that even sympathetic writers may sometimes rely on a source that later proves to be in error. Why criticize Brodie as though she is the villain when Donna Hill makes the same mistake? Furthermore, he says "it was necessary for a historian like Brodie with an interest in psychology to consider Smith's marriages and sexuality, and she opened the discussion on a scholarly level..." However, Compton says Brodie "overemphasized" sexuality. Perhaps he has not read his own book. He has far more-and more damaging-information on Joseph Smith's sexuality than Brodie! Compton relates in his footnotes (13) on page 189 that Brodie's first mention of polygamy was on page 184 although Smith's "relationship to Fanny Alger is introduced on 181. It appears to me that, with a subject like Joseph Smith, writing 181 pages before even a mention of polygamy does not indicate a "sexual obsession." As one looks back on Mormonism's beginnings, apart from claims of a new scripture, the distinguishing feature of Mormonism in its first 100 years (the period of Brodie's studies) was polygamy. Brodie was not the first-nor far from the last-writer to deal with Mormon plural marriages. Oliver Cowdery-certainly not an anti-Mormon-as early as 1838 referred to "a dirty, nasty, filthy affair of his (Joseph Smith's) and Fanny Alger's." That should predate Brodie sufficiently (page 160 of Compton's book). So what? Compton calls this "extremist language" (p. 161). On the part of Oliver Cowdery, one of the Three Witnesses? "(T)he 1835 statement (p. 161) on marriage published in the first Doctrine & Covenants proves conclusively that Mormons were being accused of "polygamy" at that time." Obviously, Brodie wasn't too far off base. On page 162, Compton mentions that Smith used polygamy to "link important leaders to himself." No doubt Smith used polygamy for this purpose sometimes, but is that defensible? Is Brodie to be abused for calling this matter to the attention of her readers? Smith's offering of "fuller exaltation and salvation" (p. 162) cannot be justified on the part of a man professing to be God's only Prophet, Seer and Revelator! Compton calls attention to "Joseph's youngest known wife, marrying her when she was fourteen" (p. 162). Compton insists Joseph did not marry young women for "sensual reasons." He relates that eleven of Smith's marriages were polyandrous and supposes that even these had "dynastic overtones." Why could not Brodie reveal these abrasions as well as Compton? What makes their revelations different? Is it just that one remains a faithful Mormon and the other an apostate? Truth is true regardless of who reports it! Smith's denial of these facts resulted in problems with Oliver Cowdery, Sidney Rigdon, William Law and others. Compton admits that "Sexuality was undoubtedly an element in Joseph Smith's plural marriages and Brodie was correct in seeing it as an important motivating factor in his polygamy" (p. 164). Then is Smith to be totally justified and Brodie abused? He goes on to say, "it is probable that Joseph Smith even had sexual relations with his polyandrous wives" (p. 165). He speaks of Mormons as "Victorian, puritanical Mormons" (p. 166). I think that is rather presumptuous-or hypocritical-to say the least. Of course if you read some of the Shakespearean era plays they do not seem as virtuous as we today usually assume. He says "polyandry was rarely discussed openly by Mormon women" yet, in his book he quotes, infers and ascribes that position to 11 of the 33 women he says were wives of Joseph Smith. Compton says, "It is certain that Presendia Buell was a polyandrous wife of Joseph Smith." Whether or not the 33 plural wives Compton ascribes to Joseph bore him children is rather beside the point, adulterers do not necessarily conceive and bear children. Surely it is evident that Brodie is attempting to reconstruct the life and actions of Joseph Smith using the material available to her. Her parents, uncle, and Joseph Fielding Smith, Jr. the LDS Church Historian, had all but prevented access to the library materials in Salt Lake City. I have always understood that No Man Knows My History was not intended to be a day by day or hour by hour reconstruction of Joseph Smith's life. She was forced to depend on the materials at her disposal. The length and depth of her research reveals a serious effort on her part to be factual. How can one presume to be able at this late date (over 50 years after her book was put into print), to question her motives and practically every event that she presented. I have always understood the book was her effort to present his life as nearly as possible as she was able to reconstruct it. On page 171, Compton quotes "Then I stood Proxy for the Prophet Joseph Smith in having sealed or adopted to him a child my Sister Presenda, had while living with Norman Buell." She evidently assumed he was Smith's child. Compton assumed he was not! Who is right? In view of Compton's premise that Joseph had at least 11 polyandrous wives (and the child's mother was one of them) that is a rather obvious assumption. If Compton is right and Smith had 33 polygamous wives (11 of them polyandrous-and several were 14-20 years of age-Brodie's assumption just may have been true. Dale Morgan's letter to Brodie (Footnote #54, p. 171) quotes Morgan as saying (of Brodie's writing about this matter): "It (the question of Joseph Smith's children by one of his polyandrous wives) is one of the strengths as well as one of the weaknesses of your book that you have not hesitated to come to bold judgments on the basis of assumptions." Was he complimenting or complaining? Was what he was doing a "strength" or a "weakness?" I would assume that a polygamous marriage would include sexual activity! Wouldn't you? Any marriage is assumed to include sexuality! As a 20th Century Christian, I somewhat agree with Brodie's point of view (cf. footnote #56, p. 194). I am "shocked by Joseph Smith's polygamy, which she (and I) interpreted (interpret) as promiscuity in essence, with polygamy as a mere disguise." On page 172, Compton says, "there is some reliable evidence that Joseph Smith's polygamous marriages did produce children." He continues that Eliza Snow possibly "had a miscarriage," and that Fanny Alger had a child, for she became pregnant while married to Joseph.... So Brodie was certainly right in asserting that sexuality was a part of Joseph Smith's marriages and probably right in asserting that there were children as a result..." So what's the problem? Whether he had 33 plural wives or 49 is beside the point. Smith was not the lily white "prophet" that most Mormons of today assume him to be! I'd hate to think he stands between the Lord and me! Why wait 50 years until after the book has been revised, and gone through a total of 25 printings and until 15 years after her death to attempt to refute her work? If I were a Mormon (and I am not), I rather think I would rather hope that Brodie's work would be true rather than Compton's! |
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